The importance of saving receipts is one of the things majority of the population learns the hard way.  Ever have a product break and didn’t bother returning it as you lost the receipt?  Or even worse, it’s tax time and you are one of those people who are getting randomly audited.  Even if you do save your receipts, finding the correct one can be like finding a needle in a Hay Stack.

Well thanks to your Cell Phone and Email, you can create digital copies anywhere you are and have file them electronically in chronological order!

What You Need:

• Picture Phone and ability to send Emails (you may send email via MMS however if you aren’t unlimited it may cost you)
• Gmail Account.

Still confused? Here’s how.

Doing this is simple; just create a label and filter for Receipts in gmail, the filter should have the following settings:

From: (address you are sending from)
Has the Word: Receipt
Has Attachment: Checked

Now that your gmail account is set up, take a picture of any receipt and email it to yourself with the word Receipt anywhere in the email(subject or message).  Gmail will automatically place this in the category for receipts.

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Gmail Labels, are a great way to keep your email inbox organized. A label will act like a folder and the filter will automatically put emails into that folder.

Create Label

1. Login to Gmail account
2. There are buttons in the upper middle, click “Labels”; it is on the same level as the “Inbox” link just to the right.
3. Click “Manage Labels”
4. In the box where it says “Create New Label” type your label name and click create
5. The “Show, Hide, Remove” links will show/hide your labels on the left side of the gmail screen and remove will delete the label.

Create Filter

1. Click “Create a filter” located near the top middle of your screen.
2. Enter information that you want to automatically do actions with (such as move to label, mark as read, or delete).
3. You may click Test Search to scan your current mail and ensure only things you want to match actually do match (You have the option to actually perform these actions on old mail on the next screen)
4. Once you are sure you like this filter click next step.
5. Using the check boxes click the actions you wish to do.
6. Click “create filter”
7. If you ever want to edit/delete the filter click on “Show current filters” on the lower left of the “filter screen”

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• Create Digital Copies of Receipts On The Fly.

When most people think of an empty banana peel, the first thing they think of is a clown slipping and falling on one. However, Re-Nest.com lists several more ways that the empty peels can be used. The list below shows 7 Alternative uses for those slippery little devils.

1. Help Your Garden Grow: Bananas are naturally high in potassium and encourages plant growth. Use banana peel or puree entire banana and bury with soil.

2. Shoe Polish: Use the peel to make your kicks nice and shiney.

3. Stop the Itch: Rub the inside of a banana peel on a bug bite helps itch relief.

4. Pain Reliever: The oil in a banana peel will help relieve the pain from burns and scratches.

5. Wart Removal: Tape a piece of banana peel on a wart, continue until it’s gone.

6. Make Houseplants Gleam: Just like peels can shine shoes, they can also be used to make the leaves of plants shine.

7. Removing Splinters: Similar to wart removal, tape a piece of the peel over the splinter. The enzymes will help dislodge the splinter and heal the wound.

7 Ways to Reuse a Banana Peel via [Re-Nest]

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I’m sure you all have heard how expensive smoking is right?  Well a trip out to dinner is the equivalent to a pack of cigarettes so these numbers are equally equatable.   The average American will grab fast food 2.3 times a week (Science Daily), which totals 120 trips a year.  Lets say you each trip is $6; that totals about 720/y just on fast food, do you go more than 2 times a week?  Well than your total will be above $1000/y.

I know you still need to eat; well cooking is a very cost saving skill, the average “cooker” will spend $4-$7 per day on food (NYTimes).  It will also take extra time out of your day, which means there is less time for you to be bored!  The benefits don’t stop there; you will lose weight and it can be a very attractive trade skill.

Some “Frugal Foods”

• Ramen Soup (May not be the healthiest, but man is it cheap and delicious)
• Rice (You’d be amazed with how cheap rice is!)
• Water(Not bottled, spending $2+ a day on soda is not only expensive but very unhealthy.)
• Beans (Chili can be an appetizing and cheap meal to make, throw in cut up hot dogs for “meat”.)
• Oatmeal (Definitely not my favorite but besides from growing your own food this is one of the cheapest options)

Saving $700-$1000 over  a year time may not seem like much; but a 5 day cruise is under $500, so saving money isn’t your game; think about it as getting an all-expense paid vacation.

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AT&T has silently started to enable MMS on iPhones running version 3.1; if you wish to Jail Break and/or unlock do not upgrade until you have instructions for jail breaking 3.1.  You should not be upgrading via iTunes, use pwnage tool to upgrade as it will ensure your phone remains jailbreakable/unlockable.

If you upgrade to 3.1 and still are getting those annoying “viewmymessage.com” messages instead of MMS Perform the following:

First we need to Enable IPCC Updates in iTunes

MAC OS X

1. Close iTunes
2. Open Terminal (Applications > Utilities > Terminal)
3. Run the command: defaults write com.apple.iTunes carrier-testing -bool TRUE

Windows 32 Bit

1. Close iTunes
2. Go to Start then Run and type CMD
3. Run this command(If you right-click on the cmd window you can paste): “C:\Program Files\iTunes\iTunes.exe” /setPrefInt carrier-testing 1

Windows 64 Bit

1. Close iTunes
2. Go to Start then Run and type CMD
3. Run this command(If you right-click on the cmd window you can paste): “C:\Program Files (x86)\iTunes\iTunes.exe” /setPrefInt carrier-testing 1

Ok, so now we can enable MMS

1. Download the IPCC Package here.
2. Ensure your iPhone is plugged in and open iTunes.
3. On the iPhone tab hold alt and click update
4. Navigate to the IPCC file you downloaded and install it.
5. Reboot iPhone.  MMS Should now be enabled.

[via: krillr]

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Saving, is one of the few things in life that people don’t take an interest in until it is too late.  Before this recession the average saving rate was 16% (Business Week), however it is hard to save during a recession and is down between 4-5% now (Money Rate).  Which doesn’t really make sense, in times of economic trouble people are preparing less for unemployment!?  If anything you should cut costs and save more if you are uncertain if you will have a job next month.

The main reason why I didn’t start a savings when I was a kid was that I didn’t think I made enough for a savings to really have any effect on my life.  Looking back, saving 10% of the 15,000 per year, I could have saved $5,000 over 5 years, or $16,000 over 10 years (factoring in a 5% interest rate).  Interest scales with the money; you literally get paid money for just having money, and the more you have the more you get.  It’s a weird but very cool fact if you are on the “savings” side of the fence.

Ok so lets jump on the other side of savings, your taking out a massive loan; your 30-year mortgage (house).  The mortgage is 300K and the current Interest rate is around 5% (HSH); by the time you pay off this house you will have paid around 600K, the price of two houses.  Why? Well your first few years of owning that house will consist of interest payments above $1000. The first month would be $1,250; meaning that up to that amount you are only paying the bank, not your actual house.  Get in the mindset of if i saved $200 this month than that will equal $1500 when I want to buy a house.  So don’t wait, start your “30 years” today.

An easy tip to avoid those “bad purchases”: Before making a purchase ask yourself if a stranger offered you the same amount of money for the item to NOT purchase it, would you take the cash or buy it anyways.

At the time of publishing, Discover Bank, has the “best savings” account; it yields 2% interest per year, if you don’t have a large sum of money to invest with, this is your best option.  If you don’t have a bank account, try to get one; however if for what ever reason you can’t, saving is still smart.  You will start off with a large sum of money, which means your first “interest paycheck” will be higher than if you didn’t save.  Interest is only really beneficial with “chunks” of cash.

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• Create Digital Copies of Receipts On The Fly.
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